Sunday, June 26, 2016

Yesterday under a beautiful blue June sky a few members of the PPAP painted along the Delaware River at the historic Pier 53 at the invitation of Susan McAninley and the The Friends Group of the Washington Avenue Green. The Pier, along with nearby piers, has a major historical significance, is a fish nursery, is part of the Mid-Atlantic flyway for migrating birds, and is an ecological study area. It also has great views of the river, shipping and beautiful Camden.

It was a great day for painting, if a bit hot by noon with temps at 90 according to the thermometer in the dash of my car. I packed my Julian Umbrella for the paint-out as I know how tough the sun can be while painting if shade isn't good or available. A few years back when I was really starting to do a lot of plein air I painted near Delaware one summers day, much like yesterday, and I went sun blind and was really wiped out from the heat. I realized then why I always saw pictures of painters with Umbrellas, sometimes more than one.

My buddy Will and I arrived at the pier about 12 or so and met Susan who gave us a tour of the Green and Pier 53 and we hunted for views to paint, We were soon joined by Dave and Diane and set up to work as we had reached solar noon. There are many, many great views to paint here and I will certainly go back a few more times to paint.

There are not many spots to paint along the river in Philly, access is limited or frankly dangerous and some places like Penn Treaty Park where I first painted with my original group the Dirty Palette Club is way too buys with people on the weekends, as well as a lot of drunks--and drunks love painters! Boy, they love to tell you about their lives and the merits of your efforts and painting theory. You can read about my previous adventures as a painter with the DPC on our blog. http://thedirtypaletteclub.blogspot.com/2012/05/return-to-delaware.html
http://thedirtypaletteclub.blogspot.com/2012/04/painting-delaware.html

Checking the angle of the sun I choose a view where the light would stay pretty much the same till I was done, so I was facing south. There were other great views but I was too late in the day to paint them and the shadows would reverse too soon to get anything done. A little while later we were joined by Susan's husband Frank, who brought the pizza and water! How great is that, a great place to paint and you get feed as well!

Will blocking in his painting

I got to painting and took a few breaks to talk with Franks and Susan who grew up nearby in South Philly and they told us many great bits of trivia and history about the area and the pier as a way station for Civil War troops and emigration into the US. In fact many of the families in Philly have great grand parents who came in and settled a stones throw away in South Philly.

There was just a little breeze even though the sun was blazing and soon the tide started coming in as Will and I painted. I used a 12 x 16 Ampersand Gessoboard and no Liquin, just a little terps as it was so hot the oil was setting up fast. It was so great to get out of the studio and a break from the comic strips and listen to the river wash up and the sounds of nature.

Will and I baking in the heat

Will's finished piece

My finished piece

Relics 12 x 16 Oil

Its very quite and tranquil there in the Green with a few runners, dog walkers and people strolling in and they keep it pretty clean, especially for trashy Philly. The group has done an amazing job rehabilitating this area and its quite a gem hidden away in South Philly. I really recommend everyone go there and check out how beautiful and peaceful this little bit of "hidden Philly" can be.

Around 5-ish we were done and headed home. A big thanks to Susan and Frank and the Friends Group for hosting us to paint and we'll be back soon to paint the Green!

Saturday, May 28, 2016

It looks like Spring has evaporated as the heat turned up to Summer this week in Philly just as I was finally able to get out of the studio and back to painting in glorious nature.

Along with Alina I was able to participate in the Burlington Plein Air 16 which is run by 28 E Gallery in Burlington NJ. We both participated in the event last year where Alina won an award for her painting. This year the event was structured around the Historic Yorkshire Garden Tour.

The event was suppose to happen last Saturday with all the painters heading out at the same time to paint, but we were all rained out and so the decision was made to allow painters to have the next week to complete their paintings.

That meant for Alina and myself Wednesday was the best day for us because of our work schedules and so we headed out from Philly up I-95 and RT 130 with a list of two gardens we could paint at.

We decided on the Pearl Blvd. spot as it had the best views that included the garden, river and also some shade, which helped a lot as it was already 90 degrees by the time we got to Burlington and started painting.

The people who's home we were painting were also very gracious allowing us the use their bathroom, and some cold water which was great, they even gave as small tour of their beautiful home full of treasures from their world travels.

It had been several months since I was able to get out and paint due to my heavy work schedule that includes two comic strips, Judge Parker and now The Phantom, but I plan to be back out as much as possible to paint this summer.

After we finished our first paintings we decided to take a break and have some lunch at Francesco Pizzeria-Ristorante which has fantastic pizza! They even gave us extra pizza boxes to carry our painting back.

That renewed our energy bar back to 100% to try for the second garden, however by that time the sun was about an hour from setting which didn't give us enough time to paint and the angle of the sun didn't give us much to work with as far as light for the smaller garden, which was narrow and nestled between two house, so we decided to pack it in and head back to Philly.

I prefer to pick my spot to paint rather than have something assigned by lottery, but I took the event as just a way to get back out and paint and do like Burlington as a city to paint in.

I'll drop my painting off today and unfortunately have to miss the opening of the show as I will be attending the Wizard World Comic Convention next weekend.

The Philadelphia Plein Air Painters

We are a group of local painters in the Philadelphia area who are drawn together through our love of painting in the Plein Air tradition out and about in the greater Philly and North East Corridor. Urban, suburban, seaside or country--everything is a subject for our brushes and palettes.